No Cart before the horse...Or, don't retrofit your strategy to match your tagline

I don't know where to start with this. Seems its creators had the same problem.

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Let's start here. I don't believe beer advertising has the same strategic mandate as say, technology or packaged goods. It's more about building a badge and reminding people why they want to be seen ordering or drinking from your bottle or can vs. some other. And for men, more than women, it's about flavor.

All that aside, I do think a smidge of an insight and a fundamental strategic starting point is a requirement. For example, Bud is the every man's beer and Heineken is for posers (subj) looking to get ahead. What does that make New Castle?

I didn't know and after watching this spot I still haven't got a clue. I actually think it's a pretty good tasting beer with nice packaging, probably some cool history and a loyal following that the folks over at headquarters probably wouldn't minde growing into a larger loyal following.

Given the tagline, I assume they want to tell people it's a dark beer that isn't as strong tasting or heavy as most dark beers. Frankly, I'm not sure how compelling that message is, but I didn't attend the focus groups so what do I know? Let's assume for the sake of argument they found this positioning had great traction with consumers. That all the dark-beer drinking folks out there are just sitting around wishing they had a dark beer that was less heavy and the light-beer drinking folks are interested in a dark beer, possibly because it makes them feel more mature or sophisticated or less like chugging through a funnel, but can't stomach the thought of drinking sludge. If either or both of these are true, it seems like they've got the right tagline.

What they don't have, in my opinion, is the right execution. First and foremost if the tagline is intended to reposition the beer based on taste, then the execution should do just that. Maybe you play off the 'I used to be a funnel chugging frat boy but now I have a real job and a kid and I need a different beer'. Or you go the route of 'I want a beer I can drink with my steak, not a beer that fills me up so I can't eat my meal'.

Instead, these guys elected to take the tagline and translate it to new meanings of "dark" (bad news) and "light" (silver lining). Why?

The only way this could possibly work is if the humor was just THAT funny its target audience would see it, laugh out loud, then go tell their friends about it. That won't happen here because the joke is cliche and forgettable.

I won't belabor the point any further. OFF Strategy.